Rarity premium for rare conditions
2.88x2.5x to 3.26x
times a common condition
- How it is computed
- How much more research spends per patient on rare (orphan) than on common conditions: rare patients are scarce, so their records replace costly recruitment. Conservative: the lowest ratio each source supports.
- Strength
- Measured: published rates or prices
The evidence (2)
- Company-reported per-patient cost in advanced orphan trials against the average Phase 3 per-patient cost
Health Advances, Orphan Drug Development: What are the Real Costs? (10 April 2019; read from an Internet Archive copy), 2019-04. Source re-read on 2026-11-06 needs a browser (PDF or protected page).
$137,000 to over $5MM against $42,000
- Per-patient trial cost of orphan drugs against non-orphan drugs, Phase 3 (EvaluatePharma data)
Jayasundara et al., Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases 2019, Estimating the clinical cost of drug development for orphan versus non-orphan drugs, 2019-01. Quote found at the source on 2026-11-06.
2.5:1